SPEECH 



OF 



y 



HON. JAMES R. DOOLITTLE, OF WISCONSIN, ^ 



ON 



THE LINCOLN-JOHNSON POLICY OF UESTOllATION; 



DELIVERED 



IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES, JANUARY 17, 1866. 




WASHINGTON: 

PRINTED AT THE CONGRESSIONAL GLOBE OFFICE. 

1866. 



THE UNION UNBEOKEN 



The Senate resumed the consideration of the joint 
resolution (S. R. No. 11) in relation to the organiza- 
tion of provisional governments within the States 
whose people were lately in rebellion against the 
United States, the pending question being on the 
motion of Mr. IIowe to refer the resolution to the 
joint committee of the two Houses to inquire into the 
condition of the States which formed the so-called 
confederate States. 

_ Uv. DOOLITTLE. I ask that the- resolu- 
tion be r^ad at the desk. 

The Secretary read it, as follows : 

Whereas the people of Virginia, of North Carolina, 
of South Carolina, of Georgia, of Florida, Alabama, 
Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas, Arkansas, and Tennes- 
see have heretofore declared their independence of 
the Government of the United States, have usurped 
authority denied to every State by the supreme law 
of the land, have abjured duties imposed upon every 
State by the same law, and have waged war against 
the United States, whereby the political functions for- 
merly granted to those people have been suspended; 
and whereas such functions cannot yet be restored 
to those people with safety to themselves or to the na- 
tion; and whereas military tribunals are not suited 
to the exercise of civil authority: Therefore, 

He it resolved by the Senate and House of Eeirrescnt- 
atives in Congress assembled. That local governments 
ought to be provisionally organized forthwith for the 
people in each of the districts named in the preamble 
hereto. 

Uv. DOOLITTLE. Mr. President, how many 
States constitute that great Republic which the 
world calls the United States of America? The 
President and those who think with him say 
thirty- six. The Senator from Massachusetts 
[Mr. Sumxer] and my colleague say twenty- 
five. Where are the eleven? Where is Vir- 
ginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, 
Alabama, Louisiana, Mississipjii, Arkansas, 
Tennessee, Florida, and Texas? llicsc eleven 
great States are larger, by thousands of square 
miles, than England, France, Spain, Portugal, 



and the Germanic Confederation, including Aus- 
tria and Prussia, all put together, as the table I 
hold in my hand shows : 

COMPARATIVE TABLE. 



Area in square miles. 

England 50,922 

France 205,671 

Spain and Portu- 
gal 219,491 

Germanic Confed- 
eration, includ- 
ing Austria and 
Prussia 241,414 



720,498 



Area in square miles. 

Virginia 61,352 

North Carolina 45,500 

South Carolina 28,000 

Georgia 58,000 

Alabama 50.722 

'Mississippi 47,156 

Louisiana 41,255 

Arkansas 52,198 

Tennessee 45,000 

Florida 59,268 

Texas 237,504 



These eleven great States, with ten million 
people, which produced, annually, four mil- 
lion bales of cotton, and are capable x)f pro- 
ducing double that number, where are they, 
and wiiat are they ? That they once constituted 
a iiart of the States of this Union is certain. 
Do they now? That is the question.^ Presi- 
dent Lincoln, during his administration, and 
President Johnson, and those who sustain their 
policy, say they do. The Senator from Mas- 
sachusetts, [Mr. Shmner,] the honorable mem- 
ber from Pennsylvania, [Mr. Steve.vs,] who 
oppose that policy, and, to my sincere regret, 
my colleague, say they do not. 

"Before giving my views, I will notice what 
is sometimes said, that this question, namely, 
whether they are States in the Union under the 
Constitution, or are Territories, is a mere ab- 
straction — an idea of no practical importance. 
While I yield to none in the desire to secure 
practical good and avoid jiractical evil, 1 can- 
not forgot that ideas rule tlie world. They are 
the spiritual forces which bring on wars, lead 
in revolutions, and underlie every great move- 



4 



ment in the scientific, religious, and political 
•world. I need go no further to find an instance 
than to this great rel)ellion against the United 
States. 

Two radical ideas — radically fialse, however — 
brought on this civil war, which has cost this 
nation more than half a million lives, and un- 
told millions of treasure. , 

First, that States had a right to secede; and. 

Second, that slavery is a blessing. 

The surrender of those two ideas by the South 
is now the basis of permanent peace. 

Sir, this question, whether those States are 
still States in this Union under the Constitution, 
or not, is no vain al)straction, no idea without 
immediate, practical, and most grave conse- 
quences. 

Is it of no practical consequence whether, to 
adopt an amendment to the Constitution, it re- 
quires the ratification of twenty-seven or only 
of twenty-one States? 

Is it of no practical importance whether 
eleven States, "n-ith their ten million people, 
shall be taxed and governed without represent- 
ation? With less than one third of that num- 
ber of i^eople, our forefathers, because the Par- 
liament of Great Britain, in which they had no 
representation, passed laws to tax them, de- 
clared the indei")endence of these States. 

Is it of no practical importance whether these 
eleven States and ten million people shall 
govern themselves under a rejmblican form of 
State government, subject only to the Consti- 
tution of the United States, or whether they 
shall be held as subject vassals, to be governed 
for an indefinite period b)' the unlimited will of 
Congress, or by the sword? 

Is it of no practical importance whether the 
flag of our countrv, for which half a million have 
laid down their lives, and wliich bears thirty- 
six stars as an emblem of a Union of thirty- 
six States, speaks a nation's truth, or is a mon- 
strous falsehood? 

These, and many like questions, are involved 
in this discussion, and depend upon the answer 
to the first. 

It is, therefore, in my judgment, a question 
of the first magnitude; a question which must 
be met ; a question which neither men nor par- 
ties can avoid or put aside. It demands and will 
have an answer. It is a question, too, upon 
which there is and there can be no comjDromise 
and no neutrality. They are States in the 
Union under the Constitution, or they are not. 
We must affirm the one or the other. We mii,^ 
stand upon one side, supporting the Lincoln 
and Johnson policj', maintaining the Union of 
the States under the Constitution tobe unbroken, 
or we must take our stand with the Senator 
from Massachusetts upon the other, and main- 
tain that the Union is broken ; that sec^^ssion is 
a success and not a failure, so far at reast as to 
Avithdraw eleven States from the Union or re- 
duce eleven States to the territorial condition. 



First, I call to mind the language of Presi- 
dent Lincoln's proclamation of December 8,- 
1863. In that he said : 

" I do further proclaim, declare, and make known, 
that whenever, in any of the States of Arkansas, Texas, 
Louisiana, Mississippi, Tennessee, Alabama, Georgia, 
Florida, South Carolina, and North Carolina, a num- 
ber of persons, not less than one tenth in number of the 
votes cast in such State at the presidential election of 
the yearof our Lord 1860, each having taken the oath 
aforesaid and not having since violated it, and being 
a qualified voter by the election law of the State ex- 
isting immediately before the so-called act of seces- 
sion, and excluding .ill others, shall reestablish a State 
government which shall be republican, and in nowise 
contravening said oath, such shall be recognized as 
the true government of the State, and the State shall 
receive thereunder the benefits of the constitutional 
provision which declares that 'the United States shall 
guaranty to every State in this Union a republican 
form of government, and shall protect each of them 
against invasion.'" 

The policy thus announced was entered upon 
at once in the States of Louisiana, Tennessee, 
and Arkansas. It received the unanimous sup- 
port of every member of his Cabinet. While 
that great man was alwaj's open to conviction, 
and ready to hear the suggestions of others, he 
became more and more settled and firm in his 
convictions as to the wisdom of that policy from 
the date of that proclamation down to the very 
day of his death. 

The PRESIDENT j))-ote)n2)ore. The morn- 
ing hour having expired, it becomes the duty 
of the Chair to call up the unfinished business 
of yesterday, being the bill (.S. No. fiO) to en- 
large the powers of the Freedmen's Bureau. 

Mr. JOHNSON. I movethat that bill be 
postponed until to-morrow, in order to allow 
the Senator from Wisconsin to proceed with 
his remarks. 

The motion was agreed to. 

Mr. DOOLITTLB. Sir, on the 11th of April 
last he spoke to the people of Washington. It 
was on the occasion of the illumination, but three 
days before his assassination. The great army 
of the rebellion had surrendered. He had him- 
self visited Richmond, where, from the very 
house occupied by Jefferson Davis, he had, from 
time to time, telegraphed the gladdening news 
of victory upon victory to a rejoicing people. 
He had returned from the chief seat of the re- 
bellion to the capital of the Union, bringing with 
him, as the spoils ofvictory,notgold, nor crowns, 
nor jewels, but the "broken chains of four mil- 
lion slaves." In that hour of triumph, in that 
moment of supreme exaltation, he could not 
refrain, when invited, from appearing before the 
people to add to the general joy. Among other 
things he said : 

"We meet this evening, not in sorrow, but in glad- 
ness of heart. The evacuation of Petersburg and 
Richmond, and the surrender of the principal iusur- 



gent army gavchopeof a righteous and speedy peace, 
whose joyous expression cannot be restrained. In the 
midst of this, however, He from whom all blessings 
flow must not be forgotten. A call for a national 
thanlcssiving is being prepared, and will be duly pro- 
mulgated. Nor must those whose harder part gives 
us the cause of rejoicing be overlooked. Their honors 
must not bo parceled out with others. I myself was 
near the front, and had the high pleasure of trans- 
mitting much of the good news to you; but no part 
of the honor, for plan or execution, is mine. To Gen- 
eral Grant, his skillful officers, and brave men, all be- 
longs." * * * * ***** 

"In the annual message of December, 18G3, and ac- 
companying proclamation, I presented a plan of re- 
construction, (as the phrase goes,) which I promised, 
if adopted by any State, should be acceptable to and 
sustained by the Executive Government of the na- 
tiony ********* 

"This plan was, in advance, submitted to the then 
Cabinet, and distinctly approved by every member 
of it." * * * * " Every part and parcel 
of the plan which has since been employed or touched 
by the action of Louisiana." 

The Senate will remember that Mr. Lincoln's 
Cabinet then consisted of Mr. Seward, Secre- 
tary of State, Mr. Chase, then Secretary of the 
Treasnry and now Chief Justice, Mr. Stanton, 
S.ecretary of War, Mr. Welles, Secretary of the 
Navj-, Mr. Usher, Secretary of the Interior, Mr. 
Blair, then Postmaster General, and Mr. Bates, 
then Attorney General. Let us remember each 
and every one of those men approved everj' part 
and parcel of that policy. 1 read still further 
from this last great speech, in which he gave. 
in most forcible language, the reasons which 
made him adhere to and cherish that policy up 
to the time of his death : 

"Some twelve thousand voters in the heretofore 
slave State of Louisiana have sworn allegiance to the 
Union ; assumed to be the rightful political power of 
the State; held elections; organized a free govern- 
ment; adopted a free State constitution, giving the 
benefit of public schools equally to black and white, 
and emiiowering the Legislature to confer the elective 
franchise upon the colored man. Their Legislature 
has already voted to ratify the constitutional amend- 
ment, recently passed by Congress, abolishing slavery 
throughout the nation. These twelve thousand per- 
sons are thus fully committed to the Union, and to 
perpetual freedom in the States — committed to the 
very things, and nearly all the things, the nation 
wants — and they ask the nation's recognition and its 
assistance to make good that committal. 

" Now, if we reject and spurn them, we do our ut- 
most to disorganize and disperse them. AVc, in effect, 
say to the white man, 'You are worthless, or worse; 
we will neither help you nor be helped by you.' To 
the blacks we say, 'This cup of liberty which these, 
your old masters, hold to your lips, we will dash from 
you, and leave you to the chances of gathering the 
spilled and scattered contents, in some vague and un- 
defined when, where, and how.' If tliis course, dis- 
couraging and paralyzing both to white and black. 



has any tendency to bringLouisiana into proper prac- 
tical relations with the Union, I have, so far, been 
unable to perceive it. 

"If, on the contrary, we recognize and sustain the 
new government of Louisiana, the converse of all this 
is made true. Wo encourage the hearts and nerve 
the arms of the twelve thousand to adhere to their 
.work, and argue for it, and proselyte for it, and fight 
for it, and feed it, and grow it, and ripen it to a com- 
plete success. The colored man, too, seeing all united 
for him, is inspired with vigilance and energj- .and 
daring, to the same end. Grant that he desires the 
elective franchise. Will he not attain it sooner by 
saving the already advanced steps toward it than by 
running backward over them? Concede that the new 
government of Louisiana is only to what it should be 
as the egg is to the fowl, we shall sooner have the fowl 
by hatching the egg than by smashing it." * * * 

" I repe.at the question, ' Can Louisiana be brought 
into proper practical relation with the Union sooner 
by sustaining or by discarding her new State govern- 
mentT What has been said of Louisiana will apply 
generally to other States." 

Sir, I have given you his own words. I would 
to God they could be read again and again in 
the hearing of every American citizen. They 
come to us as his dying legacy upon the great 
problem of the hour. They state the important 
fact that this policy was enffered upon by him 
with the full approl)ation of every member of 
his Cabinet as to every part and parcel of that 
policy. 

I repeat, and ask the Senate and the country 
to hear, we have Mr. Lincoln's positive testi- 
mony, that Mr. Seward approved it, in general 
and in detail ; Mr. Chase approved it and every 
part and parcel of it ; ]\Ir. Stanton and Mr. 
Welles also, who still remain in the Cabinet, 
full}^ and cordially approved. 

And now, sir, [ propose to show you that a 
higher triljunal than Congress, or the Chief 
Justice of the Supreme Court, or the President 
and his Cabinet, approved and sustained that 
policy. The loyal people of the United States, 
represented at Baltimore, approved it by the 
renominationof Mr. Lincoln for the Presidenc}'. 
And, as if to make the indorsement of this part 
of Mr. Lincoln's policy more emphatic, Mr. 
Johnson was nominated for the Vice Presidency, 
the very man of all others who had for a long 
time been engaged in the great work of recon- 
structing civil government in the State of Ten- 
nessee, upon the basis of that policy. It was 
objected by some in that convention, as it is here, 
tliat Tennessee had no right to representation, 
but, on motion of the distinguished ex-Senator 
from New York, (Preston King,) now no more, 
her delegates were admitted. One of her 
sons, in spite of the objection of Mr. TnADKKus 
Stevexs, that he was from a foreign State at 
w.ar with the United States and therefore an 
alien enemy, was nominated for Vice President. 
By those nominations that policy was sustained 
by the convention. 



6 



The election came on. That policy, and the 
Administration Avhich proclaimed it, aud_ the 
con /ention which indorsed it, were sustained 
by the people of the United States. 

Next to the great work of crushing the mil- 
itary power of the rebellion, this policy of re- 
construction was dearer to Mr. Lincoln, and 
more cherished by him, than any other. _ No 
sooner had the burden of liis soul been lifted, 
no sooner had he seen the surrender of the 
great army of the rebellion, than in the fullness 
and gladness of his soul he made haste to give to 
the people his views ujion the next great theme, 
reconstruction. I have just read them in your 
hearing. 

■The Senator from Massachusetts may de- 
nounce them as puerile and wanting in states- 
manship. But there they are. and there they 
will remain forever, the farewell address of 
Abraham Lincoln to the people of the United 
States upon this subject of reconstruction. 

That Mr. Johnson, upon whom the office of 
President fell, by the death of Mr. Lincoln, 
shouhl, substantially, pursue the policy begun 
by his predecessor, was, therefore, not only nat- 
ural, but, by the logic of events, almost a ne- 
cessity. How could he do otherwise? Sud- 
denh-, in a moment, as in the twinkling of an 
eye, the load is thrown from Mr. Lincoln's 
shoulders upon him ; his great responsibility, 
and his duty, and why not his cherished pol- 
icy ':' lie was surrounded l)y the same Cabinet. 
Who would expect them to advise any other 
policy V 

That policy had been fully entered upon, and 
in some States the work really done. Mr. John- 
son had himself long been engaged in that work, 
in aiding Mr. Lincoln to realize it in Tennessee. 
Besides, the convention at Baltimore had sus- 
tained it. The great Union party, Avhich re- 
elected Mr. Lincoln as President, and made Mr. 
Johnson Vice President, had indorsed it and 
sustained it triumphantly at the election. _ 

Mr. Johnson could not abandon it without 
reversing the policy of Mr. Lincoln's adminis- 
tration. That policy was advised by every mem- 
ber of his Cabinet, including, as i have stated, 
amongother names, the very distinguishednames 
of Mr. Seward, Mr. Stanton, and Mr. AVelles, 
still members of the Cabinet, and of Mr. Chase,_ 
the Chief Justice, who, just from the bedside of 
the dying President, admiui.stered to Mr. John- 
son tiie oath of his high office. How could lie 
recall that last speech and look upon the dead 
body of his predecessor; how could he lookin 
the "faces of the Chief Justice, as he swore him 
into office, and of those men in the Cabinet, all_ 
of whom had approved every part and parcel of 
that policy, and upon whom alone he could then 
rely for counsel and support in the most trying 
and difficult crisis through which any man was 
ever called to pass; how, I repeat, could he 
look upon all those surroundings, and then de- 
liberately abandon the cherished policy of Mr. 



Lincoln's administration, trample upon the ad- 
vice of the old members of his Cabinet, as well 
as of the Chief Justice himself; abandon his well- 
known convictions of duty ; falsify his own rec- 
ord andbetray the great Union party which nomi- 
nated and elected him, in tiie contingency which 
had happened, to be the President of the United 
States? Had he done so, the whole country 
would have cried out against him, and with rea- 
son. In and out of Congress, men might then 
have denounced him for betrajdng the public 
confidence.and especially forbetrayingthe party 
which elected him. His Cabinet would have 
remonstrated against it. The last great speech 
of Mr. Lincoln, like a voice from his grave, " an 
angel trumpet-tongued," would plead against 
it. And, more than all, the President would, 
in my judgment, have been what Mr. Johnson 
was never known to he, lalse to his own con- 
victions of dut_v. 

I put aside, therefore, as not worthy of consid- 
eration, the suggestions sometimes made that 
Mr. Johnson, by adhering to this policy of recon- 
struction, is ready to betray the Union cause or 
the great measures of the L'nion party. 

Having thus stated the question, and shown 
the grounds occupied by Mr. Lincoln, and that 
Mr. J ohnson is substantially pursuing his policy, 
I return to the main question, and will state, as 
briefly as I can, the grounds upon which 1 stand, 
and give my support to what i call the Lincoln- 
Johnson jwlicy of reconstruction. 

Where are those eleven States, and what is 
their situation? 

And first, v/here are they ? 
In this Union, under the Constitution, or not? 
That they once were in this LTnion all concede. 
If they have gone out from this Union it must 
have been by one or more of three ways : 

First, by the way of peaceful secession, by 
voting and resolving themselves out; or, 

Second, by successful revolution, by fighting 
their way out, to a separate independence ; or, 
Third, they have been put out by act of Con- 
gress. 

There is not, and never has been, any other 
way or ways conceived or stated than one or 
more of these three. 

Strongmen of the South have maintained that 
the first way was always open to them. They 
asserted tlie right of peaceful secession. It was 
always met, however-. It was overpowered by 
the logic of Mr. Webster in this body, and re- 
sisted by the iron will of Andrew Jackson dur- 
ing his administration. 

It has often been reasserted in this body since 
I became a member, and as often met and re- 
futed. In their folly and madness, from the 
decision here, and before the people, the South 
appealed to arms, to discuss the same ques- 
tion on the field of battle. They tried the second 
way, namely, byway of revolution, to cut their 
way out with the sword. That for a time they 
made fearful progress in that direction no one 



denies. But did tliey succeed? No man, North 
or South, dare affirm it. 

No, sir; no. 

Thanks to that Almighty Being who rules the 
universe, the great generals were found at last 
capable of organizing and wielding our immense 
forces. Grant and Sherman and Thomas and 
Sheridan, and the great officers and brave men 
under their command, crushed the rebellion, 
wrenched the sword from the hand of revolu- 
tion, and then, in the last tribunal known to 
mankind, in an appeal to the God of battles, 
by the ultima ratio regum, decided, and in 
such a way as to leave no doubt in any sane 
mind. North or South, that no State can go out 
of this Union by the way of peaceable seces- 
sion, nor by the way of successful revolution. 
They neither have the right nor the power to 
do so. 

It remains to consider the only other way, the 
third way, which, for brevity, I will call, with no 
disrespect to my honorable friend from Massa- 
chusetts, THE SUMXER WAY FOR STATES TO GO 

OUT OF THE Union, namely, by act of Con- 
gress. 

At the funeral ceremonies here, upon the 
death of Judge Collamcr, he took occasion to 
announce his theory of disunion, awarding, in 
great measure, honor, if honor it be, to the de- 
ceased, of separating the rebel States from the 
Union. 

I quote his words : 

" The great act of July 13, 1861, which gave to the 
war for the suppression of the rebellion its first con- 
gressional sanction, and invested the President with 
new powers, was drawn by him. It was he that set 
in motion the great ban, not yet lifted, by which the 
rebel States wereshiit outfromthe communion of the 
Union. This is a landmark in our history, and it 
might properly be known by the name of its author, 
as ' Collamer's statute.' " 

Upon such funeral occasions it belongs to 
each Senator to judge for himself what he shall 
say. It is a matter of taste. But one tiling 
seems to me certain ; whatever may be said at 
a funeral, it is no proper time to make a reply, 
and thus bring on debate. I, therefore, re- 
mained silent. I yield to no man in a pro- 
found regard for the memory and character of 
that really great and good man, Judge Colla- 
mer, and I intend now to do what my heart 
prompted me to do then, but which a sense of 
the proprieties of the occasion compelled me 
to forego, namely, to defend the_ statute which 
he drew, and the Congress which enacted it, 
the President who approved it, as well as him- 
self, from this charge, that this law has opened 
a way, or that he, or Congress, or the Presi- 
dent intended to open a way by wliich any 
State could go out, or be thrust out, from this 
Union of States under the Constitution. 

Sir, Congress, under the Constitution, has 
power to admit new States into this Union. 
Congress has no power to expel old States, or 



to open a way for them to go out ; and no man 
knew better than Judge Collamer that Congress 
had no such power. He could not have in- 
tended to draw such an act without violating his 
oath to support the Constitution. However 
lightly some may speak of the obligations of 
that oath, he was not one of those. He was a 
radical in the high and noble s.ense of the term, 
because he was radically right, radically tirm, 
and radically true to his convictions toward 
God and toward man. 
Ou one occasion he said : 

" I do not know how other members of the Senate 
look upon the obligation of their oath to support the 
Constitution of the United States. To me it is an 
oath registered in heaven as well as upon earth, E^nd 
there is no necessity that, in my estimation, will jus- 
tify me in the breach of it. I think those men who 
are now risking their lives upon the high places of 
the lield to support the Constitution are not to be 
treated in this Hall by us with the concession that we 
are ready, if the necessity calls for it, to break it. AH 
that our rebel enemies are engaged in is the over- 
throw of the Constitution, and all that we are con- 
tending for is its maintenance and preservation." 

Now, I will not say that the Senator from 
Massachusetts in the form of seeming praise in- 
tended to do any injustice to his name ; it was 
rather to bring, if possible, that great name to 
the support of his favorite theory. But the effect 
of what he said would, in my judgment, if ac- 
cepted, be the greatest possible dishonor; that 
whileJudgeCollamerknewthat the Constitution 
gave no right to the States to secede, and gave 
to Congress no power to expel them or to open 
a way for them to withdraw from the Union, he, 
in violation of his oath to support the Constitu- 
I tion, drew this act of July 18, 18G1, for the pur- 
pose of shutting eleven great States and their 
ten million people out from this Union under 
the Constitution. And now, sir, let us look 
into that statute. It is the fifth section, if any, 
which clothes the President with this power to 
expel States from the Union. 

How any such power can be found in the lan- 
guage of that section is to me beyond compre- 
hension. 'J'hc idea which inspired the pen that 
drew it, so far i'rom being that those States were 
outside the Union or ought to be placed outside 
this Union, was directly the opposite, namely, 
that the people of those States were in the Union, 
owing allegiance to the Constitution because 
they were in the Union ; that they were strug- 
gling to cast otF that allegiance by going out 
Irom the Union, and that a new war power 
should be placed by Congress in the hands of 
the President for the very purpose of forcing 
them to remain in the Union and resume their 
allegiance to It, and for no other purpose. That 
statute was not drawn to shut those States out, 
but to shut them in the Union ; to close every 
aveijue by which supplies could reach them, 
until the President turning against them the 



8 



sword, by whicli they undertook to cut their 
way out of the Union, should crush all armed 
resistance and compel the inhabitants to come 
under the flag and acknowledge once more their 
allegiance to the Union. What is its language ? 
After certain recitals, it declares : 

"Then and in such case it may and shall be lawful 
for the President by proclamation to declare that the 
inhabitants of such State or States, or any section or 
part thereof where such insurrection exists, are in a 
state of insurrection against the United States, and 
thereupon, all commercial intercourseby andbetween 
the same and the citizens thereof, and the citizens of 
the rest of the United States shall cease and be un- 
lawful, 80 long as such condition of hostility shall con- 
tinue;" 

with a proviso allowing the President in his dis- 
cretion to license such intercourse as he might 
think most conducive to the public interest, un- 
der rales and regulations of the Secretary of the 
Treasury. 

We notice, first of all, the authority here given 
is not to declare certain States out of the Union, 
but to declare their inhabitants in a state of in- 
surrection. Pray, what is an insurrection but 
an uprising in arms of people against their own 
Government, an effort to cast off allegiance 
they owe to it? It is clear, therefore, that if 
they were not in this Union, they could not 
make an insurrection against it. Could the peo- 
ple of Nova Scotia or Mexico make an insur- 
rection against the United States? Because 
they were in this Union is the very ground and 
the onl}' ground upon which they could be in 
insurrection at all. 

Again, sir, that statute which gave to the 
President a new war power, by its very terms 
was to cease with the war necessity. It was a 
power to stop commercial intercourse, in order 
to prevent our own citizens from feeding, cloth- 
ing, and arming the rebellion, vt^hich our armies 
went to put down. When that work was done, 
the necessity for non-intercourse was gone ; and, 
by the ver}' terms of the act, all jaower under 
it was to cease with the cessation of hostility. 

Mr. SUMNER. My friend will allow me 
just there 

The PRESIDING OFFICER, (Mr. Hexd- 
RiCKS in the chair.) Does the Senator from 
Wisconsin yield the floor to the Senator from 
Massachusetts? 

Mr. DOOLITTLE. With all my courtesy to 
my honorable friend, I prefer to go on with my 
remarks without interrujition. 

Mr. SUMNER. I should like to remind the 
Senator 

Mr. DOOLITTLE. With all courtesy to my 
honorable friend I must decline to give way, 
because I desire not to have the argument whicli 
I am making broken in upon. 

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Sena- 
tor from Wisconsin is entitled to the floor, and 
cannot be interrupted without his consent. 



Mr. SUMNER. I only want to say that my 
language was, "shut out from the communion 
of the Union," not, "from the Union;" they 
could not be shut out from that. 

The PRESIDINCt OFFICER. The Sena- 
tor from Wisconsin is entitled to the floor, and 
will proceed. 

Mr. DOOLITTLE. But, sir, I do not rest 
here. That statute was passed on the 13th of 
July, 1861, just about one week before the bat- 
tle of Bull Run. We shall never forget that 
day ! Our army, though successful in the morn- 
ing, became panic-stricken in the afternoon, and 
came back upon Washington in disorder, ut- 
terly demoralized ; and members of Congress, 
too, who went out exulting with " On to Rich- 
mond !" upon their lips, to see a great victory, 
to witness "the races" of fleeing rebels, came 
fleeing home themselves from the field of dis- 
aster. 

As soon after that battle as the members of 
Congress could conveniently assemble, in that 
hour of deep humiliation to us all, a resolution 
passed both Houses of Congress, by an almost 
unanimous vote, declaring our purpose in the 
prosecution of this war, and especially the de- 
termination of Congress in relation to the status 
and rights of the southern States. In that hour 
of defeat, when humbled before the nations 
and before the Supreme Ruler of the woHd, 
Congress, almost unanimously in both Houses, 
declared — 

"That this war is not prosecuted upon our part in 
any spirit of oppression, nor for any purpose of con- 
quest or subjugation, nor purpose of overthrowing or 
interfering with the rights or established institutions 
ofthoso States, but to defend and maintain thesuprem- 
acy of the Constitution and all laws made in pursu- 
ance thereof, and to preserve the Union with all the 
dignity, equality, and rights of the several States un- 
impaired; that as soon as these objects are accom- 
plished the war ought to cease." 

This, bear in mind, was after the passage 
of the Collamer statute, and within two weeks 
after. It is the later, the more solemn, and the 
more explicit declaration of the intention of 
Congress in carrying on the war. 

The Senator from Massachusetts says that 
statute intended to put eleven States out of this 
Union. Certainly the statute says no such 
thing. He must infer it. He rests upon infer- 
ence only, while this resolution, twelve days 
afterwards, in exjDress terms declares the in- 
tention of Congress to keep them in the Union, 
"to preserve the Union, with all the dignity, 
equality, and rights of the several States unim- 
paired." By these words, and none can be 
stronger, Congress in express terms excludes 
the possibility of that inference. It does more ; 
it rejects his whole theory of disunion. We 
expelled Bright, of Indiana, for writing a letter 
to Jefferson Davis, styling him "President of 



9 



the Confederate States," thus, wJiiloa Senator, 
acknowledging the confederacy, and sympa- 
thizing with the secessionists in amis. 

Plad the Senator from Massachusetts, on the 
2.5th of July, IbtJl, when wepassed thatresolu- 
tion to which I have referred, as to the status 
of the southern States and the jmrpose of Con- 
gress in jirosecuting the war to put down the 
insurrection, risen in his place here and de- 
clared that the Union was dissolved : that Con- 
gress, by the Collamer statute, had put eleven 
of the States out of the Union ; that the war 
was to be prosecuted for the purpose of con- 
quering, holding, and governing those eleven 
States, and ten million people, for an indelinite 
period of time, not as States under the Consti- 
tution, but as conquered provinces, aud with- 
out representation ; to be governed by the un- 
limited power of Congress, or by the sword, as 
Territories, I do not say that anv action wov^ld 
have been taken against him personally, for his 
rights as a Senator would have been his protec- 
tion ; and, more than that, the siucerity of his 
motives and his unquestioned patriotism would 
have shielded him : but I do say that if he had 
then avowed that doctrine, and been made 
amenable for the guilt of his theory, he would 
have been expelled from the Senate as a seces- 
sionist, at least a disunionist ; for certainly such 
a theory, announced then, would have given 
aid and comfort to the rebellion at home, and 
moral power to its friends abroad. 

It will be remembered that resolution was 
offered in the Senate by Mr. Johnson, the pres- 
ent President of the United States, who was 
then, and for a long time afterward remained, 
a Senator Irom the State of Tennessee, and that, 
too, long after the Collamer statute, according 
to the Senator's theory, had placed Tennessee 
outside the Union. What ! Tennessee repre- 
Rented in the Union and at the same time out- 
side the Union ! Dead and yet alive! 

But some may say that resolution passed Con- 
gress too soon after the battle of Bull Run to 
be taken as conclusive upon this question. 

I will refer to other acts of Congress if pos- 
sible still stronger. 

The Constitution says : 

"Representatives and direct taxes shall be appor- 
tioned .Tuiong the several States which may be in- 
cluded within iliis Union according to their rcsi5«ctive 
numbers^.'' 

Under that authority, Congress, after the pas- 
sage of the Collamer statute, did both — appor- 
tioned both direct taxes and ilepresentatives 
among the several States, including the southern 
as well as the northern and western States of 
this Union. I read from the eighth section of 
the act of August, 18G1 : 

"And be it further enacted, That a direct tax of 
820,000,000 be, and is hereby, annually laid upon the 
United States, and the same shall be, and is hereby, 



apportioned to the States respectively, and in man- 
ner following : 

To the State ofMaine St28,826 00 

To the State of New Hampshire 218,402 601 

To the State of Vermont 211,098 00 

To the State of Massachusetts S24.5S1 33J 

To the State of Rhode Island •. 110,963 66} 

To the State of Connecticut 308,214 00 

To the State of New York 2,003,918 661 

To the State of New Jersey 450,1.34 00 

To the State of Pennsylvania 1,940,719 33J- 

To the State ofDclaivare 74,683 33r 

To the Stale of Maryland 436,823 .33j 

to the State of Virginia 937,550 66i 

To the State of North Carolina ,576,194 66j 

To the State of South Carolina 363,570 661 

To the State of Georgia 584,367 33i 

To the State of Alabama 529,313 o3i 

To the State of Mississippi 413,084 661 

To the State of Louisiana 385,880 661 

To the State of Ohio 1,567,089 33i 

To the State of Kentucky 713,695 33i 

To the State of Tennessee 669,498 00 

To the State of Indiana 904,875 331 

To the State of Illinois 1,146,551 33i 

To the State of Missouri 761,127 33r 

To the State ofKansas 71,743 331 

To the State of Arkansas 261.886 00 

To the State of Michigan 5t)l,763 33t 

To the State of Florida 77,522 66f 

To the State of Texas .355.106 66i 

To the State of Iowa 452,088 00 

To the State of Wisconsin .519,688 66f 

To the State of California 254,5,38 66| 

To the State of Minnesota 108,524 00 

To the State of Oregon 35,140 661 

Sir. the question I pvit in the beginning, where 
are those eleven States? is answered here by 
Congress: 1 fiudthemall " included within this 
Union," tf:>*se the language of theConstittition, 
for the purpose of direct taxation. Every one 
of those eleven are found there and are taxed 
by name as States within the Union. Virginia 
as well as New York; Arkansas by the side of 
Michigan ; Florida and Texas by the side of 
Iowa and Wisconsin. Direct taxes and repre- 
sentation go together. 

Has Congress spoken upon the subject of 
representation? Most certainly. 

By an act approved the 4th of March. 1862, 
which by its terms was not to take effect till 
March 4, 1863, Congress apportioned the Rep- 
presentatives upon the basis that those eleven 
southern States were still States in the Union, 
with their right to representation unimpaired. 
By that act, modifying former acts, Congress 
apportioned Representatives to the several 
States in this Union as follows : 

To Alabama 6 

To Arkansas 3 

To California 3 

To Coimecticut 4 

To Delaware 1 

To Florida 1 

To Georgia 7 

To Illinois 13 

To Indiana .' 11 



10 



To Iowa 6 

To Kansas 1 

To Kentucky 9 

To Louisiana 5 

To Maine 5 

To Maryland 5 

To Massachusetts... .10 

To Micliigan '. 6 

To Minnesota 2 

To Mississippi 5 

To Missouri 9 

To Nevada 1 

To New Uampshire 3 

To New Jersey 5 

To New York 31 

To Nortli Carolina 7 

To Ohio 19 

To Oregon 1 

To Pennsylvania 24 

To Rhode Island 2 

To South Carolina 6 

To Tennessee 8 

To Texas 4 

To Vermont + 3 

To Virginia 8 

To West Virginia 3 

To Wisconsin 6 

That law is still in force. Under that law the 
present House of Representatives was chosen ; 
under Uuit law the present House is organized ; 
under that law those eleven States of the South 
hafve just as much right to representation as the 
other tvv-enty-five. 

Whether those States are in a condition to 
choose Representatives, and whether they have 
chosen right Representatives, are questions I 
will discuss hereafter. I now speak only of their 
right to have representation under the <!xisting 
law of Congress. - 

Thus, by the action of Congress in appor- 
tioning direct taxes and representation — thosp 
two fundamentals in republican government — 
the status of those eleven States as States in- 
cluded within this Union is declared and acted 
upon. 

Once more, by the act of the 7th of June, 
1862, amended as late as February, 18G3, Con- 
gress, in the ninth section, provided that the 
tax commissioners in insurrectionary districts, 
after bidding in for the United States lands sold 
for unpaid taxes, should, in the name of the 
United States, enter upon and take possession 
of the same, and lease the same "until the said 
rebellion and insurrection in said State shall be 
put do\yn, and the civil authority of the United 
States established, and until the people of 
said State shall elect a Legislature and State 
officers, who shall take an oath to support the 
Constitution of the United States, to be an- 
nounced by the proclamation of the President." 
And the twelfth section provides "that the pro- 
ceeds of the said leases and sales shall be paid 
into the Treasury of the United States, one 
fourth of which shall be paid over to the Gov- 
ernor of said State," "when such insurrection 
shall be puj down, and the people shall elect a 



Legislature and State officers who shall take 
an oath to support the Constitution of the United 
States, and such fact shall be proclaimed by 
the President, for the purpose of reimbursing 
the loyal citizens of said State, or for such other 
purpose as said State may direct." 

Congress here declares in these sections, not 
that the States are outside the Union, not that 
they have lost their rights in the Union, but 
recognizing the insurrection in these States, 
declares four things : 

1. The intention of Congress to put down the 
insurrection and reestablish the civil authority 
in these States. 

2. When the insurrection is put down the 
people of these States have the right to elect 
their Legislature, Governor, and State officers. 

3. When the people elect them, and they take 
their oath to support the Constitution of the 
United States, the President is, by law, required 
to issue his proclamation to that effect. And 

4. After the issue of such proclamation, the 
Secretary of the Treasury is required to pay 
over certain moneys to the Governor of 
the State, to be disposed "of as the State may 

DIRECT. 

That law is in force now ; is still the supreme 
law of the land. Its language demonstrates 
with complete certainty — a certainty which 
exclude? all doubt — that, in the judgment of 
Congress, those eleven States are still States in 
this Union under the Constitution. 

Having shown those States to be in the 
Union under the Constitution, I now inquire, 
what is their true situation? What rights 
have they, and whal duties devolve on them? 

To answer these important questions let us 
inquire, what constitutes a State ? 

"A State, in the meaning of public law, is a com- 
plete or sclf-suiRcient body of persons united together 
in one community for the defense of their rights. It 
has affairs and interests; it deliberates, and becomes 
a moral person, having understanding and will, and 
is susceptible of obligations and laws." 

All the great writers on public law agree in 
this. 

" In a more limited sense the word State sometinie.s 
expresses merely the positive or actual organization 
of the legislative, executive, or judicial powers; thuf 
the aJtual Government is designated sometimes by the 
name of State." 

This distinction between what constitutes a 
State in the meaning of public law, and the 
word State as sometimes used to designate the 
form of its government, is just as clear as the 
distinction between a man and the garment he 
wears. In the Declaration of Independence 
thisgreatdistinction between theState, the])udy 
political, which constitutes the State, and the 
form of its government, between "the people" 
whose right it is " to after or to abolish" their 
" form of government," and " institute a new 



11 



government,'' " organizing its powers in such 
form as to them shall seem most likely to effect 
their safety and happiness," and their frame of 
government is most clearly recognized. The 
State, the peoj^le, the body-politic, "institute, 
alter, or abolish their form of government." 
Despotism sometimes treats the body-politic, 
the State, the people, as if the people were made 
for the government, and confounds the State 
with its ruling organization. Not so under the 
Declaration of Independence, under our repub- 
lican system. Here the form of government is 
but an agency to serve the State. Legislatures, 
judges, and executive officers are servants and 
not masters. I repeat, under the old despotism 
the form of government was organized to put all 
power in the monarch, who sometimes claimed 
to be the^State itself. It was Louis XIV who 
said, '^r EtatjC' est moi!'^ lamtheState. But 
the people of France, the State, decapitated 
this despotic assumption in the person of one of 
his successors. James I asserted the same abso- 
lutism, and the people of England, tue State, 
did the same thing when it brought Charles I ro 
the block. It proved to be a voi-y sad mistake in 
those crowned heads thus to iguof e this distinc- 
tion between the State and its accidents, be- 
tween the body-politic itself and a mere form 
of government, when they, in their absolutism, 
assumed themselves to be, the State. 

This distinction, as it seems to me, is some- 
times lost sight of among us, and is the occa- 
sion of differences of views on the subject of 
reconstruction. I may be pardoned, therefore, 
if I dwell still longer on this important point. 

I have shown that in view of public law 
nothing can be more clear than that a State 
does not consist of the form of its government. 
That is one of its accidents. That may be 
democratic, aristocratic, or theocratic ; it may 
be militai-y ; it may be republican, despotic, or 
monarchical. It may have any one of these 
forms, or a mixed one, and yet it is a State. 
It may change its government every year, as a 
tree casts otf its foliage. The State no more 
consists of its form of government tBan a man 
consists of the garment with which he is clothed. 
He may change that every day, he may be 
stripped of any garment whatever ; but still 
the man remains ; and for a State to change its 
form, or, for the time being, to be stripped of all 
form of government, no more destroys its exist- 
ence than is a man destroyed when he takes 
off one coat to put on another, or is stripped 
entirely of his garments. 

Nor is a State destroyed by the declaration 
of martial law in it, nor by war, unless con- 
quered byaibreign Power, or dismembered by 
revolution, and made into two or more States. 
To be invaded does not destroy it, if it expel 
the invader. To be torn by civil war, "and 
even drenched in fraternal blood," does not 
destroy it either, unless the final issue of arms 
shall be against it. 



Take the case of Mexico : 'once a part of the 
Spanish empire ; then a republic ; then an em- 
pire ; again a republic ; and then a military dic- 
tatorship ; once more a republic : in danger now 
of being usurfjed by an Austrian monarch, under 
the protectorate of Napoleon. 

But, under all these different form.s of govern- 
ment, despotic, republican, military, or impe- 
rial, it is the same State. Times without number 
it has been in civil war, in revolution, almost in 
anarchy. Its existence as a State, however, 
still remains ; and its rights as a State, among the 
nations, and especially to choose its own rulers 
and form of government, remain unimpaired. 

Let us now inquire what constitutes a State 
in this Union, under the Constitution? I an- 
swer, the same things which constitute a State 
not in this Union, except so far as its rights, 
2)0wers, and sovereignty are limited by the Con- 
stitution of the United States. Under that, the 
United States has entire and absolute sover- 
eignty over all external affairs ; overall relations 
with foreign Powers. The United States has also 
paramount and absolute sovereignty overall in- 
ternal affairs committed to it by the Constitution. 
The State has a limited sovereignty over its do- 
mestic affairs and interests. I say limited sover- 
eignty, because an amendment to the Constitu- 
ticfti of the United States, which three fourths of 
all the States can adopt at any time, will still 
further abridge the rights and powers reserved 
to the States, and thus give additional puwers to 
the United States. Subject to these limitations, 
however, States in this Union have all the es 
sential attributes, rights, and powers of States 
not in this Union. 

One of the limitations upon those rights is that 
it shall have no power to organize any State 
government not republican in form, v>-hile it 
may adopt any form of republican government. 
And the same distinction between a State and 
its government is clearly recognized in the 
clause of the Constitution which provides that 
' ' the United States shall guaranty to every State 
in this Union a republican form of govern- 
ment." We see by this language a "State in 
this Union" is one thing; the form of its gov- 
ernment another and different thing, llecog- 
nizing the right of a State, under the lav>- of 
nations, to put on or put off its form of gov- 
ernment, it was thought essential to the more 
perfect union of these States under the Con- 
stitution to restrict this power of tlie State over 
its form of government so far as to deny its 
right to put on any other than a repuldican one. 
And, therefore, when conspiracy and rebellion 
attempts it, or when usurpation succeeds in 
doing so, in any State In this Union, the United 
States not only has the right, but is l)Ound to 
intervene against such usurpation, and restore 
to the State a republican form of State govern- 
ment. 

And nov/, what are the facts? Two radical 
ideas in the cotton States — radically false, how- 



12 



ever — namely, that the States had a right to 
secede, and that slavery was a blessing, had 
been so long advocated by the statesmen, press, 
schools, and clergy of those States, that a large 
portion of their people, both men and women, 
came to lielieve in them. These ideas became 
a part of their political and religious faith. 
That alone' explains the desperate valor and 
obstinacy displayed by them in this struggle. 

Those ideas, like a contagion, pervaded the 
cotton States, and took deep root in the States 
of North Carolina, Virginia, Tennessee, Arkan- 
sas, Missouri, and Kentucky— not to the same 
extent, however. From conviction, bypersua- 
sion, through sympathy, or fear, or force, many 
of the people — not a majority, however — of 
the Gulf States followed the lead of their chief 
conspirators, and were plunged by them head- 
long into rebellion. Most of the persons exer- 
cising the functions of State government — the 
functionaries — from choice, force, or interest, 
joined it also, and thereby the State govern- 
ments, as organized, -v^ere dominated by the 
rebellion and made to do its work. It was a 
usurpation. 

In that work they went further, and endeav- 
ored to establish a confederation of States, as 
an indeijendcnt Power among the nations of the 
earth. As all these proceedings were in viSla- 
tion of the Constitution, and legally null and 
void, the United States was bound to treat them 
as such, and maintain the supremacy of the Con- 
stitution. 

The rebellion appealed to the sword. Had 
the rebellion been successful it would have be- 
come a revolution, and whether right or wrong, 
the separation of those States and the overthrow 
of the Constitution in those States would have 
become an accomplished fact. But the rebel- 
lion was not successful. To attempt and to 
succeed is one thing; to attempt and fail is 
another. In the one case it is suppressed in- 
surrection; in the other a successful revolution, 
in which a new Power is born into the family 
of nations. Like the bonds for the confederate 
debt, payable only after the United States shall 
recognize its independence, the confederacy 
itself can have no existence until its independ- 
ence is secured. The whole question turns on 
success or failure, victory or defeat. 

But here arises another and entirely different 
question : what effect did the rebellion and our 
overcoming it have vipon the functions of the 
so-called confederacy and of the State govern- 
ments ? The functions of the confederacy, with 
the confederation itself, were utterly overthrown. 
It was a complete collapse. Under the Consti- 
tution it never had any validity. It was always 
null and void — an illegality ; more, sir, a crime. 
It rested not upon its right, but upon its sword. 
When that was taken it vanished. And all that 
remains to the great conspirators are the disap- 
pointed hopes and hideous dreams, unrealized, 
of madness, folly, and ambition. 



But what effect did the rebellion have during 
its existence upon the forms of government, 
upon the persons exercising the functions of 
government, and upon the laws themselves ex- 
isting before the rebellion in these States? I 
answer, generally, the rebellion from the be- 
ginning was an attempt at revolution, to dis- 
solve the allegiance of those States and their 
23eople to the Constitution of the United States, 
and to transfer that allegiance to the new con- 
federation of States ; and for the time being just 
such changes were made in their form of gov- 
ernment and functionaries and laws as would 
aid that object, and no more. 

Bear in m'ind, the rebellion did not contem- 
plate destroying these States or reducing thera 
into Territories at all. The prominent idea was 
or pretended to be to save to the States greater 
rights and powers and sovereignty than were 
conceded to them in the Union under the Fed- 
eral Constitution, one of which v.'as this right 
of State secession. 

The whole purpose of the rebellion was to 
transfer the allegiance of those wStates from the 
Federal Union to the confederation of the 
South. Our whole purpose was to prevent that, 
and save those States in the Union, and com- 
pel them and their people to acknowledge their 
allegiance to it. 

AVe struggled to save the States in a more 
perfect Union under our Constitution. 

They struggled to save the States with greater 
rights and pon'ers in the confederation. 

Upon this the war was made by them, and 
upon that issue it went on until the end. 

Neither party belligerent sought to destroy, 
but to save the States. 

Neither party sought to destroy, but to save 
a republican form of government in each of 
those States. 

Neither party sought to take from the people 
of those States the right to choose their Gover- 
nors and Legislatures, and to have their own 
judicial officers, nor to take away the right of 
representation in a national Government. 

But the real issue was whether these officers 
would bear allegiance to the Federal Union or 
to the rebel confederacy. Neither party strug- 
gled to take from the people of those States 
their right to govern themselves, under their 
own State laws — which, after all, is republican 
government — nor to disturb the great body of 
those State laws. Except in so far as they aided 
the Union or the rebel cause, neither sought to 
make any change, or claimed the right to make 
any, whatever. It is true that slavery, to defend 
which Avas the avowed object of the rebellion, 
and which became during the war the chief 
sujiport of its armies, was put directly in issue. 
It was the corner-stone of their confederacy ; 
and when the confederacy fell its corner-stone 
was of course buried in its ruins. I can affirm, 
then, that neither t!ie State nor its government, 
neither its office of Governor, its Legislature, 



13 



or its judiciary, were, during the rebellion, 
sought to be destroyed or changed in any man- 
ner by either belligerent party, any further than 
it bore upon the question of allegiance to the 
Union upon one side, or to the rebel confed- 
eracy upon the other, and to the existence or 
the destruction of slavery. 

But for slavery, and questions growing out 
of it, and ambitions and ideas fostered by it, 
there never would have been any rebellion at all. 

No change was sought in the status of the 
States, in the forms of their governments, or in 
their laws, except for or on account of slavery 
alone. 

Take the case of Georgia, the empire State 
of the South. Did the rebellion attempt to de- 
stroy the State of Georgia, as a State? Not at 
all. It did attempt to dissolve all relations with 
the United States, and transfer them to the re- 
bellious confederacy ; to throw off allegiance 
to the Federal Constitution, and come under 
the confederate constitution ; in short, to take 
Georgia as a State out of the Union and put 
it into another union, in a new confederation. 
Had the rebellion succeeded, would the State of 
Georgia have been destroyed? It would cer- 
tainly have ceased to be a State in this Union, but 
it would have«till existed as a powerful State, not 
as a Territory, in its new political relations. The 
great body of its constitution would remain the 
same, the great body of its civil and criminal 
laws the same, as before the rebellion. All the 
laws on contracts, bargain, sale, and conveyance 
of real estate ; all the laws concerning real or 
personal estate ; the laws of marriage ; the fam- 
ily relations; and generally all the rights and 
remedies affecting persons and property and 
personal liberty, would have remained the same. 
No efibrt was made materially to change them. 
The only effect, in case the rebellion had suc- 
ceeded, would have l)een to make GeorgiaaState 
outside of this Union, a State in another Union. 

Nov/ that the rebellion has utterly failed to 
put the State of Georgia into a new union, did 
the attempt to do so, and the crushing of that 
attempt, put Georgia as a State out of this 
Union? or destroy Georgia as a State in this 
Union? or reduce Georgia from a State in this 
Union to be a Territory? This seems to be the 
view advocated by my colleague in his elaborate 
and able speech upon this resolution. It is due 
to him and to the important questions involved 
that I give some fui-ther attention to this part 
of the subject. 

I shall not go over the ground I have already 
trod ; I will only observe that it is beyond be- 
lief to suppose that the people or the State of 
Georgia theniselves ever intended to reduce 
themselves ii-om the condition of a State to the 
condition of a Territor)-. Their ruling idea, 
their intensest wish, was to exalt the State and 
make its sovereignty paramount. It was with 
them a passion. It became their frenzy. The 
United States had no such purpose either. 



I have already shown you that Ijy all the 
legislation of Congress, by every proclamation 
of the President, neither Congress nor the Presi- 
dent ever held any other language than what 
was expressed in the last clause of the resolu- 
tion of July 24, 18G1, that our purpose was to 
maintain the "supremacy of the Constitution 
and all laws made in pursuance thereof, and to 
preserve the Union, with all the dignity, equal- 
ity, and rights of the several States unimpaired. ' ' 

But to pursue the case of Georgia a little 
further. AVhile, as I have shown, neither party 
belligerent sought to destroy, and both sought 
to save and to hold the State of Georgia, the 
one as a State in this Union, and the other as 
a State in the rel)el confederation, did the issue 
of arms, which decided it should not be a State 
in the confederation, and should remain under 
the supremacy of the Constitution, reduce 
Georgia to the territorial condition, against her 
own wish and the avowed purpose of Congress? 
I have already shown that Georgia was not 
changed from a State to a Territory by the re- 
bellion. Was it so changed by our crushing 
the reljellion? 

I admit that, pending the progress of this 
great civil war, the greatest the world ever saw, 
the growth of military power was such in all 
those States of the South as to almost suspend 
the civil laws — certainly during the last two 
years of the rebellion; that rebel martial law 
dominated the whole confederacy, and subjected 
at will the civil law to its dominion. It became 
for the time being a bloody rebel military des- 
potism. 

When our armies entered Georgia and over- 
come the reljel army, then what was the effect ? 
The first and immediate effect was to substi- 
tute Union martial rule for rebel martial rule. 
Neither the one nor the other, as we have seen, 
destroyed the existence of the State. But it 
did what war always does, more or less, sus- 
pended for the time being the civil laws and the 
functions of civil government in the clash of 
arms. It neither suspended nor destroyed the 
State, but it changed the ruling power in it 
from the commander of the rebel army to the 
commander of the Union arm)'. • 

Just before General Sherman entered Geor- 
gia, what was the law of Georgia? The will 
of the rebel general. Just after his surrender, 
what became the law of Georgia then?. The 
will of General Sherman, under the Command- 
er-in-Chief, both under the Constitution of the 
United States. The whole people of Georgia, 
black and white, bond and free, became subject, 
for the time being, to military rule, subject to 
militar}' control, under the laws of war. Of all 
governments the military is most despotic. It is 
concentrated despotism, despotism without any 
mixture. He could have wasted every field, 
burned every dwelling, sacked every town, 
pressed every man into service. He did cap- 
ture and set free- every slave. I may here say 



14 



those slaves are our prisoners, captives which 
we have taken from their masters ; and by the 
agencies of the Freedmen's Bureau, under the 
War Department, we are now endeavoring to 
make tliein free in fact, as well as in right. 

There was not a horse or mule he could not 
have taken; not a man, woman, or child he 
could not have sent out of the State or emploj^ed 
in any service he might have deemed necessary 
or useful to put down the rebellion, to put an 
end to the war, which the law of nations does 
not forbid. 

But did General Sherman destroy or intend 
to destroy the State of Georgia? Did the Pres- 
ident order him to destroy it? By no means. 
He went to save, not to destroy. Did Congress 
direct the President to destroy it? No ; but it 
did direct him, in the most solemn form, to pros- 
ecute the war to preserve Georgia as a State in 
the Union, with all its "dignity, equality, and 
rights unimpared," and that when that object 
was accomplished the war ought to cease. To 
that end Congress clothed the President with 
greater military power than any nation has de- 
veloped in modern times. And all this tremen- 
dous power of the President is conferred by law 
of Congi'css. Nothing, in my judgment, can be 
more certain than that Congress has by law ex- 
pressly delegated to the President the power to 
do all he has done in those States, or it has im- 
posed upon him duties which necessarily in- 
volved or implied all the powers he has exercised. 

By the act of July 22, 1861, the President was 
authorized to accept five hundred thousand vol- 
unteers for the purpose of suppressing insur- 
rection, ''provided that the services of the vol- 
unteers shall be for such time as the President 
may direct, not exceeding three years, nor less 
than six months, and they shall l)e disbanded 
at the end of the war. ' ' Disbanded by whom ? 
By the President. When disbanded? At the 
end of the war. 

Congress by this and other acts authorizes the 
President to put into the field nearly two mil- 
lion soldiers to put down this rebellion ; to use 
every means on sea and on land known to civ- 
ilized warfare to put an end to the war; Con- 
gress expressly directs him to disband the vol- 
unteers at the end of the war, and by act of 
July 29, 18G1, to reduce the standing Army to 
twenty-five thousand within one year after the 
end of the "existing insurrection and rebel- 
lion." 

Butwhat shall constitute the endiof the war? 
Congress, i)y resolution of July 24, unanimously 
Jeclai-ed the end to be when the su])remacy of 
the Constitution is reestablished, and the Union 
is preserved with the rights, equality, and dig- 
nity of every State unimpaired. Congress also 
declares that the reduction of the standing Army 
shall take place v/ithin "one year after the con- 
stitutional authority of the Government of the 
United States shall be reestablished, and or- 
ganized resistance to such authority shall no I 



longer exist" — that is, one year after the end 
of the war. It is not, as the Senator from Mas- 
sachusetts and my colleague seem to suppose, 
to end when those eleven States shall be re- 
duced from their position of States in the Union 
with their "dignity, equality, and rights unim- 
paired," to the condition of Territories, which 
are mere dependencies, with no dignity, no 
equality, no rights under the Constitution, ex- 
cept to be .governed by the absolute will of a 
Congress in which they have no representation, 
or to be held by the despotism of the sword. 
The end of the war was to be the suppression 
of the rebellion and the maintenance of the 
Union, under the Constitution, unbroken. 

But who is to judge when the constitutional 
authority of the Government is reijstablished? 
Who is to judge when the organized resistance 
to such authority has ceased ? Upon whom rests 
the responsibility of deciding these questions? 
Congress expressly says the volunteers shall 
be emploj'ed as long as the "President shall 
direct ; that he shall disband them at the end 
of the war ; and reduce the regular Army one 
year after constitutional authority shall be re- 
established and organized resistance no longer 
exist." 

The President alone is made the judge of the 
time when the insurrection is suppressed and 
when the Army shall be withdrawn. It is no 
power and no responsibility assumed by him in 
derogation of law. It is expressly imposed upoi 
him by Congress as a duty. Congress by law 
authorized and required the President, 

First, to raise the Army. 

Second, to suppress the insurrection, and 
reestablish the supremacy of the Constitution. 

Third, to preserve the Union of the States 
with their rights in the Union unimpaired. 

Fourth, to judge and determine when those 
ends are attained. 

Fifth, after those ends shall be attained, to 
disband the Army, and return the soldiers once 
more to the pursuits of peace. 

In short, Congress not only empowered, but 
required, the President to perform a twofold 
duty : one, to make war ; and the other, to 
stop making war after its end is reached ; in 
other words, to make peace ; the first, to draw 
and wield the sword ; the second, after making 
peace, to return it to its scabbard. 

The first of these great duties, namely, draw- 
ing the sword and wielding it, rested mainly 
upon President Lincc^ln. The second, namely. 
making peace, and then sheathing the sword, 
rests mainly upon his successor; although most 
fortunately, for him, and for the whole people, 
Mr. Lincoln had already entered upon the great 
work of reconstruction, of making peace, in or- 
der to be able, after peace had come — to borrow 
his own beautiful language, after "peace had 
come, and come to stay," to fulfill that other 
great duty imposed upon him by the laws of 
Congress, namely, to disband his immense 



15 



Army and send them home ; in a word, to restore 
a nation's peace, in a union of States and peo- 
ples under the Constitution, with "their rights 
unimpaired," and, after tliat great work, theend 
and object of all our struggles and sacrifices, 
was done, to sheathe the nation's sword. While 
he lived, Mr. Lincoln performed these duties, 
and performed them well. It is true, there 
were some mistakes in the beginning ; with our 
inexperience and impatience the wonder is there 
were not more. Time Avas necessary to accom- 
plish the great work, to educate the public 
mind, to prepare the armies, and to find the 
leaders who were capable of commanding them. 

How could Mr. Lincoln know, unless gifted 
with omniscience, that in the person of a teacher 
of a military academy in Louisiana, was to be 
found that Major General Sherman, who, like 
God's flaming minister, at the head of his con- 
quering legions, was to sweep through the heart 
of the rebellion? How could he Jinow that in 
that quiet, unostentatious citizen of Galena, was 
to be found the great captain of the age. Lieu- 
tenant General Grant, who knew when, "like 
Fabius, to be the cloud, and like Scipio, the 
thunderbolt of war?" Thank Heaven! he found 
the great commanders at last, which in God's 
own good time brought the final and supreme 
victory over the rebellion. Thanlc God! Mr. 
Lincoln was permitted to live until the first great 
work of crushing the rebellion was almost done, 
and the second hardly less important work of 
reconstruction was already well begun. I have 
already called your attention to his last public 
speech just before his assassination, In which, in 
gladness of heart whose expression could not be 
restrained, for the hope of a righteous and speedy 
peace, and in which, also, with a power of logic 
and clearness of statement, and force of illustra- 
tion never surj^assed in the best efforts of that 
great and good man, he explained and defended 
and enforced this policy of reconstruction. 

It was at such a moment — a moment of most 
supreme exaltation — when the prayer of his soul 
was answered ; when the long night of blood and 
agony and tears was past, and the golden light of 
the morning ofpeace dawned upon his vision, he 
fell by the assassin's hand — liis consciousness 
suspended in an instant. From the acme of 
human glory he passed to the glory on high — 
from this mortal to the immortal life — a martyr 
to the cause of his country, andof liberty to all 
mankind. It was what the ancient world would 
call an apotheosis. 

Thus the great office of President providen- 
tially fell upon Mr. Johnson, with all its duties 
and all its responsibilities ; and the gravest of 
them all, now that the armed forces of the re- 
bellion have surrendered, is this second great 
duty of making peace, and then disbanding the 
Army. When he took the Presidency there 
were more than a million men upon the rolls 
of the Army, and many of the rebel armies were 
still in the field. 



I now come to the consideration of the most, 
important, and just at this moment perhaps the 
most practical, question, namely: what were the 
powers and duties imposed by law upon the 
Pregident, in closing the war and making peace, 
which, of necessity, rhust precede the disband- 
ing of the Army? 

Now, in the very nature of things, making 
peace is just as much an executive duty as 
waging war. 

Who can know, but the Commander-in-Chief, 
when his adversary yields, when he is destroyed 
or captured, surrenders, or makes overtures of 
peace? To whom does the vanquished party 
cry for quarter and terms of surrender, but to 
him who wields the sword? 

I repeat, sir, making peace is an executive 
duty just as much as making war. The law of 
Congress which authorized the war authorized 
the stopping of the war; the disbanding of the 
forces which are employed in it, Avhen the Pres- 
ident has finished his work and shall think it 
safe and proper to do so ; when he is assured 
that the war is over, that peace has come, "'and 
come to stay." 

If we are engaged in war with a foreign coun- 
try, when we get through with the war, the 
President makes peace. Congress has nothing 
to do with it. The President enters into a treaty 
of peace, and that treaty Is submitted to the 
Senate for ratification. If two thirds of the Sen- 
ate advise and consent, the treaty is ratified and 
j peace is made. Congress may declare war. 
I they do not make peace. 

! How is peace made in case of a civil war 
among ourselves? When we overcame armed 
resistance to our laws and the Constitution, 
which is civil war, when the insurgents shall, 
in good faith, submit themselves to the laws 
and the Constitution, peace follows of cour.s<\ 
Peace has already come, for obedience to the 
laws is peace. 

All the great writers on public law agree that 
the whole end and purpose of a just war Is to 
obtain a just and righteous peace ; and having 
shown that this duty of making peace has been 
placed by Congress upon the, President; hav- 
ing shown that, from the necessities of the case, 
such a duty is executive, and therefore, in its 
nature, impossible to be done by Congress ex- 
cept through the Executive, I proceed to In- 
quire with whom, and in what way, is the Presi- 
dent to make that peace which was thfe object 
of the war on our part, and which was a condi- 
tion precedent to withdrawing the Army? That 
involves this other inquiry, who and what was 
or is at war against the LTnited States? 

First of all, the rebel army. 

No one can doubt the power of the President 
to deal with that — to fight it, crush it, capture 
it, or accept its surrender, with or without con- 
ditions. If upon conditions, these conditions 
bind the good faith not only of the Executive 
but of the L^uited States. 



16 



In the terms of Lee' s capitulation there was 
an important condition inserted, binding the 
good faith of the United States, namely, that, 
upon condition of their obedience to the laws, 
the officers and soldiera of the rebel armies 
should not be disturbed by the authorities of 
the United States. What member of Congress, 
what man, in or out of Congress, would pro- 
pose a violation, on our part, of that stipula-. 
tion ? 

There is. in the second place, the j^eople of 
those States, who have been declared in insur- 
rection, who, from giving aid and comfort to 
the rebellion, have incurred the crime of trea- 
son against the United States, and who are lia- 
ble, upon trial and conviction, to forfeit their 
property, their citizenship, and even their li^'es. 

What jiower has the President, under the 
Constitution and laws, to deal with these im- 
armerfinsurgents? First, under the Constitu- 
tion, he has the power to pardon and restore 
to citizenship, either before or after convic- 
tion : he has the power of amnesty, upon such 
terms and conditions as he shall judge most 
conducive to the peace of the country. 

If, as many contend, the insurgents are to be 
treated only in their capacity of individuals, 
and not in their capacity as States, this power 
of pardon alone v,-ould cover the whole case, 
and he could restore all to citizenship. 

But he had another power over them under 
the laws of Congress ; and I now inquire, upon 
the surrender of the armies, what further power 
had the President to deal with those persons 
who, though not found in arms, v/ere still equally 
guilty by aiding and aljetting the rebellion ? I 
answer, all the power of Commander-in-Chief 
exercising military rule in those States for the 
time being. 

By the law of nations, the commander of a 
great and conquering army when ho enters a 
State, for the time being subjects all the civil 
laws to military control ; his will becomes the 
supreme law, and he a temporary dictator. He', 
may organize a provisional civil government, 
as the Supreme Court decided in the case of 
Cross against Harrison, to preserve order and 
prevent anarchy. Beyond all question, before 
withdrawing or disbanding his Army, he had the 
power, and it was his imperative duty, to know 
^ whether the rebels not found in arms, who, as 
many insist, v/ere a large majority of the peo- 
ple of those States, had also submitted and 
surrendered the rebel cause. Had he at once 
withdrawn the Union Army upon the surrender 
of the rebel army, who knov,-s but that another 
rebel army would have been raised at once to 
fight against the Government? It was as much 
his duty, therefore, under the laws of Con- 
gress, to make sure of their submission before 
withdrawing the trooj^s as it was to make sure 
of the surrender of their armies. Without their 
submiission his work would have been only half 
done. He therefore had a right — ay, sir, it 



was his imperative duty — to deal directly with 
the unarmed rebels as well as with their mil- 
itary forces, which he could do both as mili- 
tary commander, and a.^ holding the power to 
pardon. 

But there are some v.-ho maintain that the 
States, as bodies politic, in their State capacity 
waged this war upon the Government. With- 
out admitting or denying this assumption, grant, 
for the sake of the argument, that to be so, what 
power and duty would, in that view of the case, 
be imposed upon the President by law of Con- 
gress? I answer, to deal with the States as 
belligerents. 

If the States, as such, were in rebellion and 
vraging war against the "United States, then, of 
course, the law authorizing the President to 
prosecute the war against the rebellion of ne- 
cessity authorized the President to prosecute 
the war against the States ; and, as he was not 
authorized to disband the Army until the war 
was over, and as the war could not be over until 
the States submitted to the conditions of peace, 
the President had the power and it became his 
duty to deal directly with the States itpon the 
terms and conditions of peace. It was jnst as 
much a necessity for him to know that the 
States submitted and accepted the terms of 
peace, as that their armies should surrender, 
before he disbanded the Army of the United 
States. The object of all legitimate war is to 
conquer a peace. 

If the States, as such, were at war against the 
Uni.ed States, the capture of an army would not 
end the war so long as they should remain hos- 
tile. 'I'he Army was to be reduced when ' ' or- 
ganized resistance" shoyld no longer exist. So 
long as organized States are at war against the 
Government organized resistance does exist, 
and he could not disband the Army. Had he 
immediately upon the surrender of the armed 
forces disbanded our Army, leaving the States 
still at war, there would be no peace, and could 
be no peace ; and peace was to be a condition 
precedent to his disbandment of the Army. All 
the writers on the law of nations concur that the 
only lawful purpose of war is peace. The Pres- 
ident, therefore, being authorized by law to make 
peace, was empovi'cred to deal with all the par- 
ties at war again.st the United States, namely, 
with the rebel army; with all the rebel Insur- 
gents, vvdiether they are to be regarded as act- 
ing in their individual capacity, or in their 
organized poliiical capacitv as the people of a 
State. 

I now inquire, what must be the terms and 
conditions of peace in order to put an end to 
civil war in these United States ? I answer, the 
Constitution of the United States is the para- 
mount and indissoluble bond of union and re- 
lationship and peace among the several States. 
An attempt to overthrow that is civil war. Sub- 
mission to that is peace. Therefore, neither 
the President, nor Congress, nor the Supreme 



17 



Court, nor all put together, can make any otlier 
treaty of peace or bond of relationship among 
the States. Nothing short of successful rev- 
olution, or of a decision of the sovereign people 
of the United States to amend that Constitution, 
can change the relationship) between the States 
one jot or tittle. Though men and parties may 
change, the Constitution as the basis of that 
relationship in this Union will remain perpetual. 

What terms had the President a right to de- 
mand of these States, or of their people, as con- 
ditions precedent to peace and the withdrawal 
of the Army? 

First, and before all, and as the basis of all, 
unqualified submission to the Constitution of the 
United States, and all laws of Congress passed 
in pursuance thereof. 

Second, the annulling of all acts, laws, and 
proceedings by which the States made or pros- 
ecuted war against the United States, including 
the rebel debt. 

Third, acquiescence in the situation which the 
war has brought upon them, including the ab- 
olition of slavery, for and on account of which 
they made the war; for the sincerity of such 
acquiescence, and as the sujareme test of its good 
faith, the adoption of the constitutional amend- 
ment by which slavery, the cause of the war, 
is surrendered and made imj^ossible, and liberty 
made sure, by being placed under the guardian- 
ship of Congress in every State and Territory 
forever. 

Fourth, the practical resumption of their 
political duties, upon those terms, as States in 
the Union. 

These are the conditions, in substance, upon 
which President Lincoln almost three years ago 
announced' to the people of these States the 
terms of pacification to which he pledged the 
support of the Executive Government. . 

These are the substance of the terms offered 
by President Johnson. 

Several of the States, or the people of sev- 
eral States, have accepted them, and offer now 
to resume all their poi-itical duties as States in 
this Union, and practically enjoy their rights as 
such. Shall we allow them to do so ? 

If these terms have been accepted by these 
States, or the people of these States, in good 
faith, is not the faith of this nation pledged ? 
Just as much pledged as by the terms contained 
in the surrender of their armies? 

It is not a sufRcient answer to say, this Con- 
gress is not bound by the acts of preceding Con- 
gresses, and therefore we can pass laws requiring 
the President to impose other and new terms of 
pacification not required by preceding Con- 
gresses. Technically that may be urged ; but 
it will not do for a great nation, dealing with a 
fallen enemy after he has surrendered, to im- 
pose new and other terms. Had we been fight- 
mg with any foreign Power, the treaty made by 
the President would have been most scrupu- 
lously kept. As between and among the States, 



the Constitution — which is the treaty of peace, 
and more than a treaty, which forms a perfect 
Union, and makes the States one family — is cer- 
tainly to be regarded with equal sacredness and 
validity on our part, when after a civil war peace 
is made, aud the oifending citizen or State makes 
submission in good faith, and seeks to renew 
allegiance. Nothing is more clear than that we 
have made no conquest of these States. We 
hold them only by virtue of our original right as 
States under the Constitution. 

But the question is sometimes put, by what 
power then, if these States are still in the Union, 
does the President appoint these provisional or 
militarj' governors? That question is impor- 
tant ; but to that question the answer, in my 
judgment, is perfectly clear. The President 
does not make the appointment of these agents, 
call them by what name you will, provisional 
governors, military governors, commissioners, 
agents, heralds of peace, generals, anything 
you please, nor does he employ these agencies, 
by virtue of his authority as a civil magistrate. 
They are not civil appointments. They are 
in no sense civil oSicers, for there is no law 
under which they are appointed at all. They 
arc mere military agents of the President, as 
Commander-in-Chiefof the Army, who is bound 
to ascertain the fact, which he must know before 
he can discharge this duty of mustering the 
forces out and of withdrawing the Army. He 
sends these agents into the several States for 
the purpose of ascertaining whether the rebel- 
lion is suppressed ; not only whether the i^eople 
have ceased armed resistance, but intend to sub- 
mit in good faith and make no more resistance 
to the authority of the Government. These 
agents are by him authorized to ascertain that 
fact; in substance, to put certain questions to 
the people in these States, no matter in what 
form they are to be answered, whether by an 
election, the casting of ballots, or by an oath. 
The question is, "Are you ■williug now, in good 
faith, to submit to and accept the true situation 
which the war has brought upon you? Are you 
ready, as free States, to put on a republican 
form of government? Andiyeyou determined 
hereafter to be lawful and law-abiding citizens 
ofthe United States?" Ifthey answer that they 
are, what then? ' 'Assure me of that,' " says the 
President, "audi will withdraw the military 
power; I will no longer holdyou as Command- 
er-in-Chief; I will no longer govern you by 
martial law ; I will withdraw the troops and let 
the civil laws, which are silent in the midst of 
anns, once more come into full play. You may 
substitute the ballot of the loyal citizen for the 
bayonet of the soldier which I command. I 
can then safely sheathe the sword and leave you 
to yourselves. And when I can do that there 
is peace." 

This is the substance of it all. You may say 
there is an air of the civilian, a scent of the civil 
law and civil authority in the legal forms em- 



18 



ployed in which to put and answer these ques- 
tions. Whatoftliat? These agents are military 
agents, although wearing the garb of the civilian. 
They are called provisional governors, but in 
reality they are commissioners to propose terms 
of peace or to see if peace has come in reality, 
or whether it is a hollow and deceitful appear- 
ance of peace only. They are not civil gov- 
ernors, but provisional governors. No matter 
what you call them ; names are of no conse- 
quence. If they should be sent out simply as 
spies, by a commanding general to ascertain 
the temper of the people ; to learn whether they 
mean to keep the peace, or, as soon as the Army 
is withdrawn, to fight again, for the purjjosc of 
satisfying the President whether he can safely 
withdraw his military force or not, it is all the 
same thing. It is, of necessity, a military ques- 
tion, and clearly within the scope and duty of a 
military commander. It is, therefore, no inva- 
sion, no trampling ixpon the rights of any of 
those States, to use such agencies. 

Now, to illustrate this a little more fully. 
Suppose the President had not employed any- 
body, but had gone himself to do all these 
things that his agent, his commissioner, pro- 
visional governor, or whatever you call him, is 
authorized by him to do ; and suppose he should 
go around himself among the people, and that 
all his Cabinet should go along with him, ad- 
ministering oaths of allegiance, and organizing 
elections by which the people could show their 
disposition toward the Government, in order 
that, upon his own knowledge, he could deter- 
mine whether it was his duty still to keep the 
Army in force or to withdraw it, and say to the 
people of the State, " Now you can go on ; I 
leave you to yourself; reorganize your civil 
government, republican in form;" what then 
would become of this objection that the Presi- 
dent was assuming power? It would vanish in 
an instant. • 

But suppose he had done this, which in my 
judgment would have been the simplest of all ; 
suppose he had authorized the general in com- 
mand to act for him, to do all this through offi- 
cers in the Army, to test the loyalty and alle- 
giance of the people of those States toward the 
(xovernment of the United States; to advise 
them to accept the situation in Avhich the war 
has placed them ; to abolish the institution of 
slavery ; to ratify the amendment to the Con- 
stitution of the United States which abolishes 
slavery in every State, and thus demonstrate 
that they have accepted their situation as free 
States forever as the result of this war? Or, 
go a step further, and suppose that he had 
authorized General Sherman to make just these 
propositions to them ; suppose they had been 
made as a part of the term of the surren- 
der of the armies under the express direction 
of the President, who could ever doubt tlie 
President's power as Commander-in-Chief to 
make them? Who, then, I ask, can doubt that 



the President has power to send an agent down 
into any one of those States, and Ijy the co- 
operation of the military commander, do pre- 
cisely the same thing now? Who can doubt it? 

The reason, probably, why the Administra- 
tion, instead of emjaloj'ing a general in com- 
mand, ai^pointed special agents to do this duty, 
was twofold : first, because it was supposed that 
some person who hadpersonal influence among 
the people, who had not been connected with 
the Army, might have more influence in pre- 
vailing upon that people to accept the situa- 
tion war had brought upon them than one who 
had passed through their country in the ter- 
rible storm of war, and whose red right hand 
had been to them like the scourge of God. It 
was doubtless supposed that a man selected 
from among their own people, of great influ- 
ence among them, might be listened to, that his 
counsels would be more likely to lead them in 
their very souls to submit, in good faith, to the 
authority of the Government. We know that, 
in ancient times, there were certain persons 
performing substantially the same duties, M'ho 
were denominated heralds, who were sent out 
to announce terms of peace iipon the termina- 
tion of the conflict. It does not matter by what 
names these persons are called. The power 
exists as one of the necessary incidents of mili- 
tary authority and military operations, a jjart 
of which is to make peace as well as to make 
war. 

Another reason, probablj^, why Mr. Johnson 
appointed these provisional governors grows 
out of the fact that his predecessor made sim- 
ilar appointments, and substantially adopted 
the same policy. As Mr. Johnson's Cabinet is 
composed of the same men who constituted the 
Cabinet of Mr. Lincoln, no doubt their advice 
has been to him the same which they gave to 
Mr. Lincoln, and which he has accepted as the 
tr-ue policy in restoring civil government in 
those States. 

You remember, as I have before stated, that 
Mr. Johnson himself was appointed military 
governor of Tennessee. He had experience 
in that capacity in endeavoring to restore civil 
government in that State. Probably no man 
in the United States was better prepared to 
judge than Andrew Johnson, growing out of 
the fact of his ability, his perfect knowledge of 
the South and of the people of the South, and 
his actual experience while he was military 
governor, as he was called, of Tennessee. 
Therefore he was likely to follow Mr. Lincoln 
in the line of policy adopted by him, and which 
he had himself actually tried and put into oper- 
ation. 

But I now come to the question of represent- 
ation in Congress. 

Having shown them to be States in this Union, 
and therefore entitled to representation under 
the Constitution ; having shown that Congress, 
by the same law under which the present House 



19 



was elected and organized, apportioned the two 
hundred and forty-one members just as much 
among these eleven southern States as among 
the remaining twentj^-five, and that under that 
law their right to representation is just as cer- 
tain as the right of any northern State, I now 
come to consider another and wholly different 
question. 

First, whether they have properly chosen 
Senators and Kepresentatives ; and 

Second, whether they have chosen right Rep- 
resentatives. 

Although a State may have a right to choose 
Representatives, it may not be in a condition 
to choose them. A raging pestilence might 
suspend elections ; a foreign invasion might 
make them impossible; insurrection and civil 
war might do the same thing ; the temper of a 
people might become so diseased or estranged 
that for a time they would refuse to choose 
them. While this would not take away the 
right to have Representatives it would deprive 
them of Representatives in fact. 

Again, in exercising the right to choose, they 
may select men, incapable, ineligible, or unfit 
to be received in either House of Congress. 

A friend asked me the other day, shall this 
Congress admit as Senators and Representa- 
tives rebels fresh from the battle-field, whose 
swords are yet dripping with the blood of our 
sons and brothers? No, sir, no; who has ever 
thought or dreamed of any such thing? The 
oath required of them makes that impossible. 
And does any one suppose that this Senate, 
which expelled Bright for writing a letter to 
Jefferson Davis, has not the power or the cour- 
age to defend itself against the guilty instigators 
of this great crime? Have we no confidence in 
ourselves ? 

Another asked, what security have we thit 
the South will not rebel again if weadmittheir 
representatives ? I answer this question by an- 
other : would there not be tenfold more danger 
of their rebelling if vv^e do not give them repre- 
sentation than if we do? Who does not know 
that the most justifiable of all causes for rebel- 
lion or revolution is to tax and goi'crn a people 
without representation ? The old Thirteen re- 
belled against England for that, and four of those 
thirteen are among the States my colleague 
would now reduce to the territorial condition. 
Up to this time the South never had any justi- 
fiable cause for rebellion. 

Follow out the policy of the Senator from 
Massachusetts and my colleague, and you will 
give them what all the world will say is a just 
cause for war. By so doing, we shall change 
positions with them. We shall place ourselves 
in the wrong, and give them just cause of com- 
plaint, now that they have surrendered. We 
were right in the beginning; right in every step 
of our progress in the war ; right in authorizing 
the President to end the war vrhen the suprem- 
acy of the Constitution was vindicated, and the 



union of the States, with their rights and equal- 
ity unimpaired, restored ; right in tendering to 
the rebels upon their surrender magnanimous 
terms of peace, more magnanimous than we 
would offer to a foreign foe, because they are a 
part of our people, with whom by interest, by 
necessity, and by the logic of geogi;aphical and 
commercial position, we are forefer bound to 
live and hold the closest relations. If we now 
direct the President to withdraw the terms of 
pacification ho has offered and they have ac- 
cepted, and above all, if we should in the spirit 
of this resolution of my colleague, declare them 
no longer States in this Union, but Territories, 
subject to the control of Congress as the other 
Territories of the United States, we should place 
ourselves in the wrong, falsify all our profes- 
sions of devotion to the integrity of the Union, 
and reduce them to be our dependents and 
vassals. 

For one moment consider the condition of the 
Territories. They are not under the Constitu- 
tion at all. Mr. Webster in one of his masterly 
efforts, Mr. Benton in his review of the Dred 
Scott case, demonstrated that the Constitution is 
for States and not for Territories at all. Territo- 
ries are outside dependencies, and governed by 
Congress, not under its power limited by the 
Constitution, but by its absolute power. The 
Supreme Court decided in Canter's case, and 
have often affirmed the doctrine, that Congress 
possessed all legislative power over the Territo- 
ries as absolute as in the District of Columbia. 

What, in effect, does the Senator from Mas- 
sachusetts and my colleague jDropose ? To place 
outside of the Constitution and to govern with 
unlimited power eleven States and ten million 
people, nearly one third of all the States and 
jieople of the United States, without any rep- 
resentation. And is this the way to pacify a 
great country and satisfy the wish of a great 
people ? 

The people of the South have been so com- 
pletely prostrated by this war that they would 
bear almost any humiliation before rising in 
arms again. But if there is any mode of pro- 
ceeding more likely than any other to provoke 
them to do so it is this proposition thus to re- 
duce them to be our vassals. 

What effect would it have upon ourselves ? 
It would turn the North into a nation of slave- 
holders, the people of the South being our slaves. 
All slavery in the end destroys both master and 
slave. This would very soon make the Sovith 
not fit to be free, and we ourselves become too 
much corrupted and demoralized by the exer- 
cise of such power to permit them to be free. 

To hold them thus would require the presence 
of a large standing army, which, if kept on foot 
for a long time, is sure in the end to undermine 
the virtue of republican institutions and pre- 
pare the way for a concentrated despotism, per- 
haps an empire. 

It would subject us to incalculable expense, 



20 



which the financial situation of the country is 
in no condition to bear. 

It would, in my opinion, and in this I feel 
that I am sustained by the opinion of the pres- 
ent able head of the Treasury, affect our na- 
tional credit most disastrously at home and 
abroad. It is well known that ujoon the recep- 
tion of the President's message at Frankfort-on- 
the-Main our bonds advanced two jier cent. 
Reverse his policy and treat those States as sub- 
ject, conquered provinces, and our national 
credit would sink at once. Such a course would 
incite, if not produce, another civil war. 

It would keep the question open, to be the 
source of ever-increasing irritation, until all 
hope of union would be gone. 

It would demoralize and dishearten the friends 
of the Union at the South, and turn their loyalty 
into hatred. "If," said Mr. Lincoln, "we re- 
ject and spuna them, we do our utmost to dis- 
organize and disperse them. If, on the contrary, 
we recognize and sustain them, the converse of 
all this is made true ; we encourage their hearts 
and nerve their arms to adhere to their work, 
and argue for it, and proselyte for it, and fight 
for it, and feed it, and grow it, and ripen it into 
a complete success." It would make those who 
hated the Union during the war, and who, upon 
the surrender of Lee, gave up all hope or thought 
of further resistance, and were ready to renew 
their allegiance to the Constitution, hate the 
Union more bitterly than ever. 

Again, sir, other grave considerations plead 
to sustain the President's policy. How can we 
hope that the great mass of the people South 
will engage earnestly and hopefully in the pro- 
duction of cotton, the great staple of export, 
unless the i^acification of the States is made 
complete, and in time for the coming crop? 

Our financial situation, therefore, demands 
peace, and peace as a reality. Such a peace 
would be impossible if we attempt to reduce 
those States to the condition of Territories. 

Some speak of the wealth of our mines. I do 
not doubt it. But for present resources to meet 
our engagements they cannot compare with the 
cotton fields of the South. Every dollar of gold 
produced in Colorado has thus far cost two. 
When the railroad reaches the mountains, to 
carry laborers and supplies, that will be re- 
versed ; but not till then. 

But were peace now fully restored the cot- 
ton fields of the South, worked ))y free labor 
and free capital, this season would produce all 
that our necessities require, and all that indus- 
try should hope for to those who engage in it. 

I have just seen a letter from William A. 
Parker, from Evergreen, Alabama, under the 
date of January 3, 1866, to the Commissioner 
of Agriculture, in which he saj's : 

"As it may not be uninteresting to you to know what 
are the agricultural prospects of the present year in 
this section, I will briefly state the results of my ob- 
servations in this and the adjoining county of Monroe. 



"There is a vigorous and enterprising spirit preva- 
lent. The preparations for the coming crop in the 
two respects o^land and labor arc more extensive 
than ever before. 

"The frecdmen have shown themselves willing and 
ready to enter into fair and reasonable contracts to 
perform labor. Nearly all of them are already em- 
ployed. 

" Planters and farmers are sanguine. A better state 
of things generally exists than has been known for a 
long time in this part of the country. There is less 
idleness and more work on the part of all classes. 
There is also being exhibited an increased interest in 
education. 

"I have the honor to be, &e." 

Sir, ever)'thing in our power should be done 
to secure the crop of the coming season. 

Again, sir, how do we stand in relation to 
foreign Powers? Who does not know that dur- 
ing the rebellion the Emperor of France desired 
and believed in its success? Because he believed 
in it he undertook the Mexican intervention. 
Lord Palmerston sympathized with him, and 
would, if he could, have committed England to 
join v.'ith him to establish the independence of 
the southern confederacy. 

But England saw a few piratical cruisers, built 
in her ports and manned by her sailors, under 
the rebel flag sweeping our commerce from the 
ocean. She saw at once, that in case of war 
with us, our cruisers would swarm in every sea 
and destroy her commerce in return. There- 
fore, from interest, she refused to accept Na- 
poleon's oiler. 

And now, can any man so far blind himself 
to the situation as not to know that we must 
close up this civil war and restore the union of 
these States in such a manner as to have the right 
to claim the allegiance of the southern people 
before we can speak with the voice of a united 
people, either to England about damages or to 
France about intervention in Mexico? 

There is no great consideration worthy of a 
statesman in this crisis which does not j^lead 
for and insist upon pacification, and, in my judg- 
ment, there is no better way than to carry out 
the Lincoln-Johnson policy of reconstruction. 

The war of blood is over. It is now a moral 
warfare : a warfare with the reasons, hearts, 
feelings, passions, prejudices, and sentiments 
of that people. And of all the propositions 
which can be conceived there is none, in my 
judgment, which will so shock the reason, so 
deeply wound the sensibilities, and so rouse the 
passions and prejudices of that people, as this 
proposition to tax and govern them without 
representation. I now speak of the great mass 
of the people in those States. 

Let no man misunderstand my position. With 
those guilty leaders who, in this Senate and else- 
where, incited the people of those States to re- 
volt, I have and can have no sympathy. They 
deserve none. Since the angels rebelled in 



21 



heaven there has been, in my judgment, no 
such crime against God or man. 

Why should I have sympathy for them? Do 
I not remember that if all the blood they have 
caused to be shed had been poured out in one 
vast reservoir, Jefferson Davis, his cabinet, and 
the whole rebel congress could have swum in 
it? Do I not remember that our prisoners at 
Andersouville and at other places have been 
starved to death liy thousands, and that upon 
the authors of sucii barbarities no punishment 
is too great? Ah! can I ever forget, until this 
heart shall cease to beat, that my eldest son, 
the pride of my life, has been sacrificed in this 
war, caused by these guilty conspirators? How- 
ever strong my indignation toward the guilty 
leaders, I will not allow myself to forget that 
the great mass of the people of the South were 
honestly misled by the teachings of Calhoun 
and his disciples, the press, the schools, and 
the clergy, upon the right of secession and the 
blessings of slavery. Nofwill I blind my eyes 
to the fact, equally true, that now the mass of 
the thinking men of the South, and especially 
those who were in the rebel army, have not only 
surrendered their arms, but have surrendered 
those two ideas upon which alone they made the 
war. Upon this subject the concurrent testi- 
mony of Generals Grant and Sherman, and all 
the great officers of the Army, is conclusive. 
They have morally surrendered their cause. 

Toward the mass of the people, then, I do 
have sympathy. In my judgment it is our duty 
and our best policy to carry out in good faith 
the terms of pacification tendered ])y President 
Lincoln and President Johnson, and accepted 
by them. Let us at once recognize them as 
States in the Union, entitled to representation, 
and take up for consideration each State by 
itself, and inquire into the election returns and 
qualifications of those who claim the right to 
represent them. Let us begin with the State 
of Tennessee. 

My colleague assumes to say that he speaks 
the voice of loyal Wisconsin. Sir, I do not 
doubt his sincerity. But I venture to say that, 
in my opinion, he will find himself greatly mis- 
taken. I know that the late convention of the 
Union party in that State unanimously resolved 
that the States of the South were still States of 
this Union, and that neither by peaceful seces- 
sion nor by force of arms could they be taken 
out of this Union under the Constitution. 

Another resolution adopted by that conven- 
tion reads as follows : 

"That the animus which, caused the late rebellion 
against the United States, was born of the pride and 
ambition of an aristocracy founded upon slavery, 
which the warand the emancipation proclamation of 
President Lincoln has rightfully destroyed; but we 
deem it essential to the regeneration of the late slave, 
but now free States, that they should, in good faith, 
accept their new situation as free States, not only by 
abolishing slavery in their State constitutions, but by 



the ratification by their Legislatures of the amend- 
ment to the Constitution of the United States, sub- 
mitted by Congress and now pending, which forever 
abolishes slavery in every State, and empowers Con- 
gress to pass all laws necessary to secure liberty to all 
the people, black and white. By its adoption the 
cause of the rebellion will be removed, slavery de- 
stroyed, and liberty established upon a foundation 
which neither State, nor President, nor Congress, nor 
court, nor change of parties, can shake — as enduring 
as the globe itself. By its adoption by the people of 
those States all the world will know that they accept 
freedom as their situation, and give up shivery and 
all hope of restoring slavery forever. 

That through the influence of certain news- 
papers and speeches, there may be some division 
of sentiment among the members of the Union 
party now is possible. But when my colleague 
goes before the people of Wisconsin with the 
proposition to reduce eleven States to the ter- 
ritorial conclition ; to tax and govern eleven 
States and ten million people without represen- 
tation ; when he proposes in effect to do what the 
rebellion could not do, tear the national flag in 
twain ; to take eleven stars from that flag and 
reduce the number to twenty-five, he will find, 
in my humble opinion, that he has utterly mis- 
taken the people of Wisconsin. 

If he had said that they look upon treason as 
a crime, and that some of the guilty leaders 
should be tried and convicted ; if he had said 
that they insist that under the constitutional 
amendment Congress should see that the freed- 
man is iirotected in his civil i-ights of life, lib- 
erty, and property ; if he had said that since the 
abolition of slavery in the southern States has dis- 
turbed the basis of apportionment in the House 
of Representatives, a more just apportionment 
might be made having reference to the voting or 
taxable population of the several States, I would 
agree with him. But upon this proposition of 
his he would find himself in a minority of less 
than one third of the voters of Wisconsin. The 
loyal people of Wisconsin, and of all the States, 
have been fighting for the integrity of the Union 
and the entirety of the flag ; for pacification 
upon the basis of the union of the /States under 
the Constitution. If this Congress will not act 
upon that basis, the next Congress will. That 
is the corner-stone. Whosoever shall fall upon 
that stone will be broken in pieces \ but upon 
whomsoever it shall fall it will grind him to 
powder. Men and cliques and parties may op- 
pose and for a time postpone. But as sure as 
to-morrow's sun shall rise, it will come. What- 
soever stands in its way will be trampled in 
j)ieces. 

In conclusion, from the beginning, and from 
before the beginning, any separation or destruc- 
tion of the States, was made impossible. Under 
the old Confederation, the Union of the States 
was made ' ' perpetual. ' ' And the Constitution 
was formed to make a more "perfect Union." 
To admit, therefore, either the right of States 



22 



to secede, or the j^ower of Congress to ex- 
pel them, would be to admit into our system 
a principle of self-destruction wholly at war 
with a perpetual or perfect Union. The Con- 
stitution, every part of it, and the sjDirit which 
gives it life, are against peaceable secession ; 
and that Constitution clothes the Government 
which it creates with every human power to 
prevent a separation by force of arms. Those 
gigantic powers, which had slumbered so long 
that they were wholly unknown to the world, 
and hardly dreamed of by ourselves, have been 
lately brought into full i^lay. 

Whatever may be said of the crime of the 
rebellion, history will record it as one of the 
most persistent, self-sacrificing, and tremendous 
struggles the world ever saw ; both on the part 
of the rebels, and on the part of the loyal people 
of the United States. No other peoi^le upon 
earth could have so resisted, and no other j^eo- 
ple and no other Government could have over- 
come such resistance. 

But we did overcome it. We did prevent the 
separation of these States from the Union by 
force. Every law of Congress, every act of the 
President, every blow we struck, every shot we 
fired, every drop of blood we shed, was not to 
thrust these States out, nor to open a way for 



them to go out, nor to reduce them to Territo- 
ries, but to keep them as States in the Union, 
and compel them to remain in the Union under 
the Constitution, The flag of our country bears 
thirty-six stars, as the emblem of a Union of 
thirty-six States. Wherever it floats, over 
this Capitol, at the head of our armies, in the 
storm of battle, and in the hour of victory, 
over the sea as well as over the land, that sa- 
cred ensign, which, next to the God of heaven, 
we love and reverence as representing the 
good, the great, and the true, everywhere bears 
thirty-six stars, and thereby proclaims to the 
world the great, fundamental, national truth, 
there are thirty-six States in the Union, under 
the Constitution. Thirty-six States constitute 
that great Republic which the world calls the 
United States of America. Uj^on "that line" 
and under that flag we began the great cam- 
paign ; upon that line and under that flag half a 
million of our sons and fathers and brothers 
have laid down their lives ; upon that line and 
under that flag we fought it out to victory, and 
now, God helping me, I will continue to fight it 
out on that line and under that flag to the end, 
whoever else may abaudon it. 

[Applause in the galleries, which was checked 
by the Presiding OtHcer.] 



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